How Did the Major Federal Pandemic Response Benefits Contribute to the Deficit?

Here’s a quick overview of the pandemic response provisions and their costs.

Canada Emergency Response Benefit (CERB): As of June 28, the CERB has made over $53 billion in benefit payments to 8.16 million Canadians. This number doesn’t take into account the recent 8-week extension. With that included, $80 billion is estimated to be the total cost of the program.

Canada Emergency Student Benefit (CESB): $1.4 billion in benefit payments have been issued to 600,000 eligible Canadians. The total cost of this program is estimated at $5.2 billion.

Canada Emergency Wage Subsidy (CEWS): With the recent extension, the total cost of the program is estimated at $82.3 billion.

Canada Emergency Business Account (CEBA) – 688,000 applications have been approved as of July 3, which totals $27.41 billion in loans. Provided businesses pay back the loan by December 31, 2022, $7 billion dollars of this is forgivable. This economic snapshot updates the total cost of the program of $13.7 billion.

Additional educational resources: Come to the September 30 CE Summits for further discussion and information on "Financial Fallout: Audits and Bankruptcies"